“My dear friend,” said the cardinal, leaning, as they walked through the garden, on his friend’s arm, “you told me just now that you had been twenty years in the queen’s service.”
“Yes, it’s true. I have,” returned Guitant.
“Now, my dear Guitant, I have often remarked that in addition to your courage, which is indisputable, and your fidelity, which is invincible, you possess an admirable memory.”
“You have found that out, have you, my lord? Deuce take it—all the worse for me!”
“How?”
“There is no doubt but that one of the chief accomplishments of a courtier is to know when to forget.”
“But you, Guitant, are not a courtier. You are a brave soldier, one of the few remaining veterans of the days of Henry IV. Alas! how few to-day exist!”
“Plague on’t, my lord, have you brought me here to get my horoscope out of me?”
“No; I only brought you here to ask you,” returned Mazarin, smiling, “if you have taken any particular notice of our lieutenant of musketeers?”
“Monsieur d’Artagnan? I have had no occasion to notice him particularly; he’s an old acquaintance. He’s a Gascon. De Tréville knows him and esteems him very highly, and De Tréville, as you know, is one of the queen’s greatest friends. As a soldier the man ranks well; he did his whole duty and even more, at the siege of Rochelle—as at Suze and Perpignan.”